notes from Terry Ann

Kitty Claus

Lizzy got dressed up for Christmas and Kirk was happy to help her pose. Well actually, if I have to tell the truth .  . . neither one enjoyed the photo shoot as much as Megan and I did! Our other cat's Santa outfit had a beard - and he liked it so much I didn't get any pics of him that weren't blurry - from me giggling and him squirming. Hope your holidays have been as much fun as ours - our family is together, we have lots of snow, and our kitties are cute - what else could you ask for?

Two states, three quilt shops, and some Ambiance

 

The second day of our road trip began in Onalaska WI, and we were waiting in the parking lot when the Olive Juice Quilt Shop opened. Lots of fun fabric was waiting for us inside.

Here's Liz in one of the fabric rooms.

And here I am with shopowner Diane. 

And here's an American Girl - is that Molly?

  

Look at these creative ornaments - one filled with selvedges and one filled with pins!

Our next stop was River Road Quilts in LaCrosse, where we found a Fire Escape quilt hanging behind the cutting counter. The shop has a huge gift section in addition to a Christmas tree lot full of beautiful trees and handmade wreaths.

 

I think I want a yo-yo garland on my tree like theirs. 

Here's a yo-yo tree in progress - hmmmm . . . I wonder if I have enough greens in my stash to make one of these? How do these girls find time to do all of this fun stuff?

We headed south to Yellow Bird Art in Lansing Iowa - only a half an hour away.

 

Even more yummy stuff in here. They told us about the Ambiance Gift Shop in LaCrosse - which of course was conveniently on the way home. So we headed back across the border to Wisconsin.

Frank Sinatra was waiting for us in the bathroom at the Ambiance Gift shop - but we didn't spend much time with him because there were two floors of antiques, decorating, furniture and fun stuff.

Every single display was inviting - we actually went through twice so that we could really enjoy everything.

Liz found a metal shelf with bins for her kitchen, and I found this book rack. The shop owner is retiring and will be closing in the spring - we'll have to stop back again soon.

And then for our last stop - right around the corner to Kick Shoes. Almost dark again - and time to head home.

Are We There Yet?

last week Liz and I took off for a little road trip - something we haven't been able to do in ages. We left my house in the morning and actually thought we could get to LaCrosse before the quilt shop closed at 4:00. That was a silly plan - at 3:00 we were still in Redwing. We got a little sidetracked at Redwing Pottery - they have every single color of Fiesta and we couldn't resist! Then we went next door to our favorite antique mall - Pottery Place Antiques, which has all of our favorite kinds of glassware and pottery.

 

You can never have too much turquoise.

And red never goes out of style!

They always have a fun Christmas display - one year they had a tree decorated with red and green crocheted potholders and cookie cutters. This year my favorite was a "railing tree" with vintage ornaments.

It was almost dark by the time we finally left Redwing, and we headed south on Hwy 61. Lark Toys was still open, so we pulled in. Here's the sign in book in the entryway, which set the mood for a fun experience. We loved the huge display of antique toys. Many of our childhood toys were in the display cases with the antiques - and we had fun reminiscing.

There is a big carousel with hand carved animals - not just horses, but frogs and flamingos and birds and fish. It runs every half hour.

 

This Minnesota moose was watching the carousel from the sidelines.

 

We finally made it to LaCrosse and had a great meal downtown at Piggy's. On the way to our hotel, we came across the Rotary Lights display in Riverside Park. Over 2 million lights are used in the displays, and donations are collected for 8 area food shelves. There was a live nativity, a choir and tons of lights! I think my favorite was the elephant squirting water.  Whew, we had a great day - and tomorrow we'll get to the quilt shops.

Meet Me in Minneapolis

On Friday I met my friends Liz and Roseann in Minneapolis for some fun shopping. We started at Hunt and Gather at 50th and Xerxes. In honor of Liz coming all the way from Wisconsin, the deer behind the checkout desk was wearing a hat with an "L". It's starting to get cold here in Minneapolis so of course a warm coat is a must.

We loved this pile of plaids - and Liz already has many of these. We used some things from her plaid collection for one of the photos in my Confetti in the Corner book.

 

I found these letter cards - but there was no "T" for Terry. We also found lots and lots of Christmas stuff - even some of the same Christmas ornaments that my mom had when I was growing up.

Next we popped over to the No Coast Craft-o-rama. No ocean - but thousands of homemade goodies from snow country is how they describe the show - and that is exactly what we found! We even saw Christopher Straub from Project Runway - he had some great pleather wallets and bags. 

The show was held at Midtown Global Market on Lake Street. It has restaurants, food, and crafts from all over the world. On the way out, I picked up some fresh farm butter for my Christmas baking!

Get your popcorn ready!

Stop over to Sew on and Sew Forth to see 150 pictures of my trip to Rochester - what a great slide show! Kathy took some great pictures too - good thing because the ones I took were blurry. She's having a giveaway on her blog -  some Atkinson Designs patterns and books!

White Christmas

I got home safely from my New York trip right before Thanksgiving - and somehow that turkey just flew by! Now all of a sudden it's December and I'm ready for a white Christmas. Not the snowy kind yet - but I think a white tree would be fun! This tree would go with my half done quilt - you know, the one that I was going to finish during the blog hop.

 

I stopped at Tammy Tadd's in Sycamore Illinois on my way home from New York. Here I am with Tammy next to that scrumptious tree. Wouldn't it look great in my living room? Tammy had wonderful Christmas decorations up everywhere - even in the bathroom. 

This bed is on the other side of Tammy - my Christmas quilt (the unfinished one) would look great with those flannel sheets - and maybe Santa will bring me that embroidered pillow this Christmas . . .

 

This creative quilter made a wreath out of our Happy Holidays pattern - and she just happened to stop in the shop when I was there. She strip pieced the center triangles in green and tan and added background to make a banner shape. I love the red piping next to the binding!

 

Right around the corner from the Christmas display I found these great batik quilts - Snapshots from the Happy Hour book, and Fire Escape. Yummy!